An umpteenth road accident victim was recorded on the morning of Thursday 3 August on rue Souillac in Port-Louis. A United Bus Service (UBS) Ltd bus, whose brakes had apparently failed, was travelling towards Victoria, Port-Louis when it left the road and collided head-on with a pedestrian walking on the pavement. The victim, 19-year-old Nicholas Jason Low Kwong, who works at Courts Mammouth and lives in Roche Bois, did not survive his injuries. This teenager is the 86th victim of road accidents since the beginning of this year.
At around 9am on Thursday 3 August, a bus coming from Bell Village was travelling along rue Souillac towards Victoria station. At some point near the Dr Edgar Millien Government School, the vehicle suddenly left the road, crashed through the parapet and onto the pavement. The young man had no time to react. He was trapped between the bus and the wall of the school. A doctor from the Emergency Medical Service was called to the scene, but all he could do was pronounce the victim dead.
Police officers from Casernes Centrales police station and motorcyclists from the Traffic Branch soon arrived on the scene after being informed. The victim was identified shortly afterwards as 19-year-old Nicholas Jason Low Kwong, an employee at Courts Mammouth in Bell Village. It took the intervention of men from the Mauritius Fire and Rescue Service and the police Towing Unit to extricate the body of the teenager from between the bus and the wall of the Dr Edgar Millien Government School.
The victim’s body was taken to the mortuary of the Dr A.G. Jeetoo Hospital, Port-Louis, for an autopsy. The autopsy, carried out by Dr Prem Chamane, Principal Police Medical Officer, attributed the death to multiple injuries. The 48-year-old bus driver, who lived in Camp Diable, was taken to Casernes Centrales police station for a breathalyser test. The test was negative.
The bus driver told police that he lost control of his vehicle after the brakes failed. The bus then left the road and went down onto the pavement. The teenager, who was walking there at the time, was hit.
